Oil spill soaks up much of Anchorage's labor pool

Editor's Note: This article was originally published in the Anchorage Daily News on June 23, 1989.

A cruise boat skipper was the first to quit. Then bus drivers, an expediter and a dispatcher.

With the 1989 tourist season barely under way, Alaska Sightseeing Tours Inc. has lost six people 20 percent of the company's Anchorage operations staff.

"We've never had such a high turnover, and I attribute each and every one of them to (the oil spill)," said Chris Buchholdt, the company's Anchorage division manager. "The problem is they leave like that at a moment's notice."

Employing more than 7,000 people, the March 24 Exxon Valdez oil spill continues to deplete the southcentral Alaska work force, and its effects are keenly felt in Anchorage this summer. "Help wanted" signs are up all over town.

At Anchorage's eight Pizza Huts, franchise owner Kurban Kurani has resorted to draping "Now Accepting Applications" banners over the restaurant building fronts. Kurani says he's looking for as many as 40 recruits.

Few good statistical yardsticks are available to measure the changes in the Anchorage job market since the March 24 spill.

Local Job Service officials say the cleanup hiring has intensified a worker shortage for low paying jobs that began several years ago as the recession prompted many families to leave the state.

Pat Fremming, operations manager for the Anchorage Job Service office, reports that job orders jumped 9 percent in the three months ending May 31 compared to the same period last year. That translates into requests for 2,662 workers, 254 more than in 1988.

For those on the bottom end of the pay scale, the worker shortage is beginning to translate into better wages. In the months following the spill, competition for workers has forced Burger King to increase its average wages from $4.48 an hour to $4.98 an hour.

"I suspect that's in direct relationship to what's happened (with the cleanup)," said Larry Baker, Burger King's president.

Many fastfood workers are younger than 18, the minimum age required to work on oilspill cleanup. But they appear to be able to move up to better paying positions vacated by other workers, Baker said.

Grocery stores and hotels also are searching for workers.

"It's been tough finding young people for bagging," said Nancy Freeman, human resource supervisor for Safeway Inc. in Alaska. "The quality of the people we would normally hire has changed because there isn't the selection there used to be."

Wendi Brockhoff, acting director of human resources for the Anchorage Hilton Hotel, said the hotel normally has all its summer help hired by June 1. This year, the hotel is looking for more than a dozen workers to fill housekeeping, food service and other positions.

The spill cleanup "has made our employment situation more desperate," Brockhoff said.

The spill also appears to be taking workers away from the lowerpaying whitecollar jobs, such as those with the telephone marketing company, Electra Enterprises Inc.

"Typically we have 10 people in our office. Now we've got two (in the day) and maybe four or five at night," said Bob Lee, the company's president.

Electra's main summer project is raising money for disabled veterans through phone solicitations, Lee said. The company pays a 25 percent commission on all money raised by a worker, and guarantees at least a minimum wage.

Lee said the company tried to recruit workers through want ads but so far hasn't had much luck.

"Typically, we don't have much problem getting people to answer our ads," Lee said. "But this year we're getting 15 and 16yearolds working. The rest of the people are out there working (on the spill) and you can't blame them."

The spill also appears to be strengthening the hand of at least one local union.

Royce Rock, business manager of Carpenters Hall Local 1281, says the spill hiring has recruited most nonunion carpenters. That's forced some local companies that have relied on nonunion workers to turn to his local, Rock said.

"The nonunion companies here are not able to find any workers, so we're able to get in with them and show them how we do things," Rock said Wednesday in his office.

About 160 of the local's 800 members are on the outofwork list, he said.

The phone rang and Rock excused himself.

A company needed two more workers immediately.